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Top Five Ways to Support New Managers in Your Company

Congratulations! You’ve just promoted someone into a manager role. Now, it’s time to kick back, and let them run everything. This is going to be perfect!

You selected the right candidate, right?

You hired for attitude, not for skill like everyone says, right?

You gave them more than just the keys to the building, right?

They know exactly what to start doing, right?

Uh-oh. You didn’t?

Consequences of a New Manager

New managers need more than a “congratulations” and a slap on the back! Even if you did everything listed above, are you sure it was enough?

According to the Corporate Executive Board, new managers, on average, take up to two years to get acclimated to the new role. The average manager scores less than a five on a 10-point performance review scale, and only reaches what might be considered "acceptable" performance at two years into the role. High-performing managers are able to reach an "acceptable” rating (seven out of 10) in just a year after their promotion. High-performing leadership transitions happen 50 percent faster than average when you select a high-performing individual!

The hard part of selecting a high-performer is that they might have been a high-performer in their previous role. There’s no way to predict whether those skills that made them a high-performer in their job will translate to management. You’ve heard of the Peter Principle. It’s the saying that someone will be promoted to their highest level of incompetency! That happens when high performers are moved into management roles simply because they were a strong performer.

Create a Smooth Transition

Poor leadership transitions reduce direct reports’ performance (reducing it by 15 percent), their intent to stay (reduced by 21 percent), and engagement (reduced by 9 percent). What this means is even if your employees do stick around through the transition, they don't do well and aren't engaged. Transitioning leaders affect their own direct reports, their new manager, their previous manager and their own peers. The ripple effect is broad.

These are some of the issues holding new managers back from being high-performing: Where to start, expectations, knowing what my team needs, managing my time and theirs, accomplishing work through my team and having difficult conversations.

How to Become a Good Manager

Start with awareness. Focus on strengths. Focusing on two to three strengths results in 50 percent performance improvement. Performance starts to level out after boosting more than three strengths.

Avoid derailing behaviors: Emotionally unintelligent (reduced performance by 20 percent), lack of critical thinking (reduced performance by 23 percent), abdication of ownership (reduced performance by 20 percent). These derailing behaviors come from a desire to produce results from day one over building relationships.

Failure to recognize team members reduces their performance by 31 percent.

New managers should learn about their team, focus on collaboration and learn about team initiatives.